Me and my husband have a 21 month old, and he thinks I’m being an asshole for asking him to clean.
The way that we have worked as a family for the past year is that I work 4 days a week whilst he looks after our child, and then he works the other 2 days whilst I look after our child. Then we have a day off together. In September our child started to go to nursery for 2 days a week, which happened to be on both of the days that he looks after her. He drops her off at 8:00 and picks her up at 17:15. So he now has 9 hours of free time in the day all to himself 2 days a week.
Financially, I give him money each month to equalise our earnings because he only works 2 days at his job, and this has always been fair because the days I’m at my job he is also working by looking after our child. However things started to change when our child started nursery. We agreed that I would keep giving him money and equalising our pay each month, on the condition that on the 2 days the child is at nursery, he cleans, does shopping, and effectively contributes to the family still.
However this hasn’t happened, he will go shopping on one of those days, hoover a couple of floors, or spend 30 mins tidying, and then spend 8 hours playing his PlayStation or nintendo, or watching tv. We’ve argued a number of times about this, with me saying that it’s not fair for me to be giving him money if he doesn’t do what we agreed, and he tells me that he "deserves to relax", and that I’m financially abusing him by saying that I dont want to give him my money if he’s not doing enough.
I’m not expecting him to spend every second of those 9 hours doing chores, but when the kitchen, bathrooms, and others rooms are filthy as they currently are, I certainly expect more than the bare minimum he does.
AITA for expecting this, and for not wanting to give him money for not doing enough?
EDIT: since September he has tried to get more hours at his job but can’t. So it’s not that he doesn’t want to work on those 2 days, the issue is that since he is at home, he won’t do enough and still expects money from me.
What do you get out of the relationship? He doesn’t work full-time. He doesn’t clean. He doesn’t take care of your child. You give him money. And he calls you an asshole for expecting him to clean.
Nta. Stop giving him money. If he wants his pay “equalized” with yours he can work more than two days a week. You don’t have a husband, you have a teenage son.
NTA- I would suggest that you have to hire someone to help clean, and that would have to be paid with the money you give him.
you deserve a partner who pulls weight and stops treating you like payroll
Ok, DH. Now that LO is at nursery you can work those days and our family will be better for it as we’ll have more money and an equal division of labour/money to pay a cleaner.
Congrats! You have 2 toddlers instead of one. While he does deserve to have some relax time, there is no reason why he can’t spend an hour or 2 picking up when he has the whole house to himself.
My husband likes to play video games too but he doesn’t prioritize them. If he’s at home and the house isn’t in the best shape, he will pick up and clean. Same for me.
NTA. If he doesn’t want to clean, he can also work, and instead of you giving him money, you’ll have money to hire a cleaner. It is entirely unreasonable of him to expect you to pay him to play his video games.
INFO – why is your child in nursery when your husband is at home on those days not doing anything?
NTA. You’re not being rude or controlling. You’re asking for basic teamwork.
Just like any job. Reduce his pay, for not “working”. No work, no pay. Easy peasy.
Why are you “equalising your income?” What a strange way of viewing things. Your income isn’t equal because you work more and right now you’re working 6 days and he’s only working four if providing care for your own child counts as “work”. Stop giving him money to make things even, it’s weird and feels like pocket money. Instead sit down togeather and write a family budget if you earn 70% of the total household income then you contribute 70% to joint bills and expenses and he would contribute 30% stop paying him to parent his child. You’re both doing two days of childcare a week but he gets two days all to himself while you don’t seem to get any down time in this scenario.
Hire someone to clean and deduct that from his allowance.
Also, it doesn’t sound like he put a lot of energy into looking for additional work.
NTA
Your husband needs to have a wake up call.
* He is the house husband. *
He works less than you. He has more free days at home than you do. In order to equalize the work, He should be cleaning the house.
The alternate is you stop giving him money and hire a maid.
Lessen the money you give him by half and don’t pick up the slack. I don’t really understand why you are giving him money in the first place but to each their own